


This Love

by orphan_account



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Aftercare, BDSM, Bad BDSM Etiquette, F/F, F/M, Polyamory, Spanking, Subdrop
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-28
Updated: 2017-03-28
Packaged: 2018-10-11 21:21:38
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,242
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10474692
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: And as Sharon turns Natasha around, hooks fingers into the waistband and eases her pants down to her thighs, the sharp intake of breath tells Natasha that Sharon understands why she decided to forego underwear that morning.Even soft sweatpants feel like sandpaper over the mass of bruises, the patch of broken skin over the fullest part of one cheek.





	

**Author's Note:**

> This idea has been bugging me for weeks, and though I don't really ship Sharon/Steve/Natasha all that much, if I hadn't written it I'd have gone crazy. This is super out of my comfort zone so I hope people enjoy it.
> 
> Cameo appearance by Cartinelli.

“You summoned me to your presence, Madam?”

She’s pushing it, but she can’t help the smirk that crosses over her face at the sight of the one who had called for her, sat at the end of a table in a SHIELD conference room as if she were holding court.

“Watch it, you. Just because I let you have your fun last night doesn’t mean I want the attitude right now.”

She dips her head a little even though her companion is smiling, clearly not angry at all.

“I’m sorry,” Natasha says anyway. “Was there something you needed, ma’am?”

She’s standing like a soldier at ease; the woman now approaching her has always liked that. Even with her hands held behind her back though, Natasha can feel the ever-so-slight tremble of anticipation. She’s ashamed to think that she really, _really_ hopes her lover doesn’t need anything. Not today.

“I just wanted to check up on you,” Sharon says, a hand reaching out to squeeze Natasha’s shoulder, as if she knows what the other woman is thinking. “You seem distracted today, are you feeling sick?”

“What? No,” Natasha says, genuinely surprised by the question. It wasn’t quite noon yet; she went through her mind of everything that had happened that morning. Other than calling Stark an overgrown Star Wars trash bot she couldn’t really think of anything out of the ordinary.

“I don’t think I’ve been distracted at all. Just business as usual.”

“You ran into me in the hallway and dropped all your papers, babe.”

She pinks a little, at the memory of running headfirst into Sharon earlier that day, and at “babe.” Sharon can be stern and sometimes downright wicked, when she has Natasha pliant and obedient… but she’s also a huge fan of nicknames. And Natasha, who for some reason had never bet on tenderness, can’t get enough of it.

Still,” You’re worried because I wasn’t watching where I was going?” she teases, to play off the moment.

Sharon is so close Natasha can breathe her in, the clean of her soap and shampoo, and the merest hint of the perfume Steve had gotten her for her birthday. There’s sweat and gunpowder, because Sharon has been back at the shooting range that morning – one of her favorite pastimes.  It’s hot as hell, Natasha thinks, for her girl to know her way around guns.

And handcuffs.

Rope, knots, silk. Anything, really. They haven’t found much that Sharon can’t do, nothing that she can’t learn and apply her expertise the next night.

Sharon crosses her arms and gives Natasha The Look, which _again_ makes the shorter woman divert her eyes to her shoes. She’s playing with fire just a little bit, being sassier than she knows Sharon wants, even though on any given day Sharon loves the slight brattiness that Natasha just can’t help displaying. It’s her nature, after all.

“I worry because you’re my girlfriend,” she realizes Sharon is saying, and Natasha pays closer attention. Her thoughts have seemed to drift off a lot today, but this is probably important.

“And I worry because you’re my little one.”

Natasha blushes again. They’ve been doing this for just over a year, and she still hasn’t quite gotten used to it. That Sharon is dominant hasn’t come as _that_ much of a surprise; how much control Natasha is willing to give her, is. It’s been a year of stops and starts, joys and little accidents that show them both how far they can go. And always, a steady undercurrent of love and support just beneath how deliciously _evil_ Sharon can sometimes be.

“I’m fine, Miss,” Natasha decides to reassure, reaching out and smiling when Sharon immediately wraps her arm around Natasha’s waist. “Just a little tired.”

A slow, calculated grin spreads over Sharon’s face. “Aw, did we wear you out?”

Natasha's smile disappears. She thinks about the three of them, awake until the wee hours of the morning. She remembers the sighs and moans, the tears, begging with her face pressed into the pillow to _please_ be allowed to come, _please_. She remembers the sting of hand against skin, the taste of wet in her mouth, nails pressed into her neck, the pounding thrusts and finally, _finally dear god finally_ , release. She remembers falling asleep, used and spanked, happy and in pain, just as the sun came up.

“Maybe a little.” Sharon’s eyes are searching hers, and Natasha offers up a faint smile that she hopes looks like her usual confident self.

Apparently, it doesn’t. “Natasha, are you sure you’re—“

“I’m fine,” she cuts her off, not willing for the conversation to go any further. Sharon worries too much, really. “Just tired. It was a long night.”

She winks, and that makes Sharon laugh. Natasha loves it when Sharon laughs, when the smile lights up her eyes and seems to make her glow. She wears the same thing to work every day – blue button-up long sleeved shirt and black tight pants – but every day Natasha thinks she sees something different about her. She’d told Steve about it once and he just gave her that eye-twinkling look of being wise beyond his ninety years and told Natasha he was pretty sure what that was. She’d punched his shoulder and said the ice had turned his brain into sap.

“Maybe we ought to do it again tonight.”

“Or,” Natasha said, tipping up on her toes and allowing a kiss to Sharon’s lips, “you could be merciful and let your poor, exhausted submissive sleep.” She glances at her, her tone suddenly serious.

“Please.”

“We’ll see,” Sharon only says, kissing Natasha’s forehead. There’s no finality in it, though; Natasha knows that as sharp and commanding as Sharon can be, she’s also a total pushover, sometimes even more so than Steve.

And Natasha has said please. She’ll have a good night’s sleep.

But she says, “Whatever you want, Miss,” anyway. It’s not out of rote or duty, but because she truly will do whatever Sharon wants of her. It’s never too much.

Usually.

Sharon kisses her lips this time, then turns Natasha towards the door. “We’ve both got work to do and if we don’t get back to it Hill’s gonna put out an APB on us.”

“She’d never find me,” Natasha says, cocky to the last, and Sharon gives her a slight push.

“I’ll see you at home after work. Now shoo.” She swats playfully at Natasha.

Natasha cries out. The minute Sharon’s hand connects with her backside – so lightly it could’ve been a love pat – the pain rockets through her and causes Natasha to stumble; Sharon’s hand in a vise grip around her upper arm prevents her from crashing into the wall, and steadies her.

“Nat?!”

She breathes hard, closing her eyes because if there is one thing she doesn’t want to do right now, it’s cry. She’d done enough of that the night before. Her mouth, her attitude, always getting her in trouble. Testing her boundaries, pushing a little too far, until Steve had had enough.

Even so, after the spanking, after the tears and the harshness, Natasha had been wet. Wet and aching, more than willing to let Steve and Sharon use that to their advantage. To use her. It was only after the sun was coming up that she realized just how much the extra smacks in the heat of the moment had hurt.

She looks up at Sharon, and Natasha knows that her girlfriend knows. She’s putting two and two together: the distraction, the listlessness and clumsiness, the fact that instead of her suit or her jeans, Natasha is wearing sweatpants.

And as Sharon turns Natasha around, hooks fingers into the waistband and eases her pants down to her thighs, the sharp intake of breath tells Natasha that Sharon understands why she decided to forego underwear that morning.

Even soft sweatpants feel like sandpaper over the mass of bruises, the patch of broken skin over the fullest part of one cheek.

Usually Steve checks. Usually he rubs cream over her bottom and soothes her tears, but last night they were all so damn horny that Natasha supposes they just… forgot.

“Oh, _Natasha_.”

“It’s okay,” she rushes to say, hating the regret that has coated her girlfriend’s voice. “I’m fine.”

“You are not fine!” Sharon snaps, then briefly closes her eyes. “You are not fine, and I need… I need to talk to Steve.”

She reaches for her cell phone; Natasha grabs her hand.

“No?” she asks. “Please? I’m okay.”

Sharon puts her phone away, but shakes her head. “Steve is going to know about this,” she says, and this time, Natasha knows it’s final. “We don’t have to talk about it here, but we are going to tell him, is that clear?”

Natasha nods; then, remembering Sharon insists on verbal affirmation, says, “Yes, Miss.”

Sharon eases Natasha’s pants up over her rear end, and sighs. “ _Why_ didn’t you say anything, little one? We have safe words for a reason, Natasha.”

“It wasn’t that bad,” Natasha insists, even though the look on Sharon’s face means she is so not buying it. “It wasn’t, at least… I just think he doesn’t know his own strength? And by the time I knew it… hurt so much, you were both asleep and I didn’t want to wake you.”

Sharon looks like she’s about to say something, but Natasha hurries on. “Besides, I’m enhanced, too. I can handle it.”

“Clearly you can’t,” Sharon says, but it’s not insulting. Just matter of fact, and true.

“You guys might be enhanced but you’re still human. You still have limits.”

“I guess.” She’s reluctant to admit that she can’t take all of what her lovers dish out. She’s the Black Widow; she should be able to take anything, pleasure _and_ pain.

Sharon cups Natasha’s face in her hands, kissing her slowly and gently. “I’m sorry,” she says, and there’s an earnestness to it that hurts Natasha more than her skin. She clings to Sharon, gripping the fabric of the woman’s sleeves in her hands, resting her head on Sharon’s shoulder.

This, she thinks, is what she needed last night, even more than the sex.

And not just Sharon.

“I’m going to leave early so I can cook us dinner,” Sharon is saying as she lightly pushes Natasha away from her, still smiling a little sadly. “Any particular requests?”

“Chicken parmesan?” Natasha asks hopefully. “We haven’t had that in a while.”

“I’m lucky Angie taught me that recipe. Fastest way to your heart.”

“Nah.” She feels shy suddenly, as if she’s flirting with Sharon for the first time. “There are other ways. Some you don’t even know.”

“Oh, is that so? I look forward to finding out. Chicken parmesan it is then. Can you be home around five?”

“Yeah, I can swing it.”

“Good.” Sharon nods. “I’ll tell Steve to get his butt home around then, too.”

“He and Sam were going to train…”

“Sam can wait. This is more important.”

“You won’t—“

“Tell him?” Sharon tilts her head. “I feel like that should be your call, Natasha. We’ll wait until we’re all home to decide, all right?”

Natasha spends the rest of the day a ball of nerves. It’s good that Sharon doesn’t hover; Natasha only sees her once after their conversation in the conference room. The hallway is crowded so Sharon just gives her a nod and a calm, “Agent Romanoff.” Natasha’s grateful for that, and grateful that Steve is holed up training new recruits; by the time Natasha checks her watch and it’s 4:30, she hasn’t seen him at all.

But she also misses him.

There’s a relief when Natasha makes it home, when she can smell spices even outside the door of the apartment she shares with Steve and Sharon. The apartment had been a more recent development; she’d balked at the idea of them all living together until Steve had sat down and appealed more to her sense of logic than her heart.

“We want a relationship with you, and I know you want that,” he’d said. “It’s just easier if we’re all in the same apartment when we want to play, instead of trying to _schedule_ her place or your place or mine. I’d like a little stability, and I think you and Sharon would too.”

It had been nerve-wracking, but they had a brand-new bed with more pillows than she knew what to do with, and Natasha is pretty sure moving in with her boyfriend and girlfriend has been one of her better decisions.

“Hey, you!” Sharon greets Natasha from the stove, looking resplendent in the “Kiss the Cook” apron Natasha had given her for her birthday as a gag gift. She’d never intended for Sharon to actually wear it, but there’s something that warms her heart when Sharon refuses to cook without it. She has pasta sauce on her front and even in her hair, and Natasha can’t help but laugh, hanging her bag on the hook by the door and moving across the kitchen to her girlfriend.

“Hey.” She does what the apron says and kisses Sharon, taking a few seconds to rest their cheeks together. “Smells good in here.”

“It’s lucky I didn’t gain five hundred pounds growing up with Aunt Peggy and Angie,” Sharon says, tapping Natasha’s nose lightly. “Italian food, pies, cookies, cakes, twenty-four hours a day. God, it was heaven.”

Sharon used to not want to tell stories about her childhood, worried that it would upset Natasha, who has never had a childhood, and Steve… who has never had Peggy. But Steve is happy and in love _now_ , and Natasha enjoys the fruits of what her girlfriend learned at her aunts’ knees. So it’s a win-win situation for everyone, really.

“Want me to set the table, Miss?” Natasha asks, nevertheless unwilling to leave the warmth of Sharon’s embrace and the peaceful kitchen.

“Would you please, darling? And get out the milk.”

“Milk?” Natasha wrinkles her nose as she sets about gathering up plates. “We still have that red wine Sam gave us.”

“We also have things to talk about, and I think we should have clear heads when we do.”

“Why are you always right?”

“It’s a gift,” Sharon laughs at her, watching for a minute as Natasha is fastidious about placing the dinnerware and utensils.

The clock in the kitchen reads 5:15 when the apartment door opens once again, and Steve leans against the wall inside to survey his two girlfriends.

“I was looking forward to training with Sam, but I think this is better,” he says, not noticing how Natasha tenses up a little bit at the sound of his voice.

She’s not _afraid_ of him, she knows. Even when Steve has had her over his lap, or even when he’s been armed with a belt or any of the other implements they’ve chosen, he’s never someone to be feared. Natasha’s more afraid of how much she trusts him, than anything else.

Steve comes to kiss Sharon then Natasha in turn, strong and loving, his presence with them giving Natasha something that she can’t quite describe. She’s never talked about it with anyone, but just like her feelings for Sharon, she’s pretty sure she knows what it is.

“How much longer till dinner?”

“Hm, ten minutes maybe, long enough for you to take a shower if you want.”

“Here I thought you liked sweaty men,” Steve jokes to Sharon, and Natasha laughs.

He _is_ pretty hot when his shirt is off and he’s sweaty, she thinks. She’s a lucky girl, and so is their girlfriend.

“I do, when we’re the reason you’re sweaty,” Sharon says, and pushes Steve in the direction of the bathroom. “Hurry up, you shouldn’t keep hungry women waiting.”

Natasha waits until Steve disappears, until she hears the squeak of the pipes in the shower, before turning to Sharon.

“Is he going to be mad?” she asks, suddenly panicked. “Are _you_ mad?”

She hates making them angry, and the idea of that happening now makes her want to run out the door.

“Oh, honey.” Sharon comes into the dining room, on the pretense of straightening a wayward fork on the table, before she reaches out and enfolds Natasha in her arms.

“Natasha,” she says, deep affection in her voice. “My little spy.”

It relaxes her immediately, her body instantly easing into that softer space that she has been surprised to find she craves. Sharon rubs her back and kisses her.

“I’m not going to say we didn’t do anything wrong. You should’ve said something, and I should have paid more attention, and Steve and I both should’ve taken care of you last night. But if anybody has a right to be angry, it’s you. _Are_ you angry at us?”

Natasha looks into her eyes, and can’t find it in her. She shakes her head.

“No. He didn’t mean to.”

Sharon kisses her again. “I’m not angry, and Steve’s not going to be either. We’ll all make this right, you’ll see.”

“Okay.”

“But before dinner, please, Natasha. I don’t want this hanging over us all evening.”

She would prefer to wait until late that evening, but what Sharon says goes, and so Natasha agrees.

It isn’t long before Steve comes out of the bathroom with his hair still wet, clad in his favorite jogging pants and tee-shirt.

“I’m starving,” he pronounces, and Natasha grins. One of Steve’s favorite jokes is that he’s had over sixty years in missed dinners, and he’s trying to make up for it all at once.

“Almost done,” Sharon says. “Want to help me with the pasta?”

“Do you guys mind if I wear my pajamas?” Natasha asks suddenly, with a glance at Sharon.

“We don’t mind.” It’s said before Steve even has a chance to weigh in, and he gives both his girlfriends confused looks.

“Cool. Will, uh… will you help me, sir?”

She’s a little more formal than usual, and Steve notices that, as if he’s suddenly realizes that there is a _reason_ Sharon had texted him at noon.

_Training cancelled. Be home at 5. Non-negotiable._

“Hey, I always like the chance to get you out of your clothes,” Steve says smoothly, and Natasha rolls her eyes, but she’s happy that some of the tension seems to have left the room.

“You sound like Stark.” She walks into their shared bedroom, reaching into the top drawer for her favorite pajama shorts and top. She’s still nervous, but Natasha reminds herself that this is _Steve_. This is Captain America. Her boyfriend, her sir.

She’s safe here.

“I’ve been practicing. What do you need me to do, _myshka_?”

They don’t know why Steve has hit upon calling Natasha a mouse, or why she enjoys it so much, but it works for them, serves to remind her that she’s the “little” one. If it was anyone else but Steve or Sharon treating her like that, she’d probably punch them.

She’s unabashed at pulling off her shirt in front of him and slipping on her pajama top, then hands him the shorts. She usually loves it when Steve dresses her. This time though, it’s tinged with something different.

And so she turns her back to him, not wanting to see his face as she pulls down her sweatpants.

“… _fuck_.”

“Language, Captain America,” she says wryly. He looks horrified when she turns to him again, his face white and his eyes wide.

“It’s not as bad as you th—“

“No, let me see,” he manages, taking her arm and half-moving her to get a better view.

She knows it _is_ bad. She knows there’s a black and blue handprint just his size, that there’s bloodied and broken patches of skin that make her _not_ want to take a shower, _ever_ , because that is going to hurt like hell. It isn’t like there haven’t been bruises before; she even _likes_ it when Sharon and Steve mark her, because she is theirs. She has what no one else has; at least, not with Captain America and who Natasha refers to jokingly as Agent Carter, Junior. She gets to come home every night and fall asleep in the same bed with heroes. What’s a little beating, if it means that?

Steve hasn’t slipped her pajama pants on. Instead, abruptly he says, “Stay here,” and leaves her alone in the bedroom, which feels suddenly cold and lonely. She would go straight for Sharon, but Steve has told her to stay there, and in a tone which she would be an idiot to disobey.

She stays. But she doesn’t have to wait long, because he’s only gone to the adjoining bathroom and come back with a washcloth and a white tube. He sits on the edge of the bed and motions to her.

“Come here, Natasha,” he says, and she backs up a little, shaking her head.

“Please, I’m sorry.” Her voice is little more than a whisper, and Steve sighs.

“Tasha, no,” he responds, infinitely gentle. “It’s all right, come here.”

She approaches him and he takes her hand, pulling her over his lap. The washcloth is cool but stings her wounded skin as Steve cleans her, and Natasha clenches her teeth.

“I am so sorry,” Steve says, one hand in her hair while the other is guiding the washcloth as delicately as he can. “I’m sorry, Natasha, why didn’t you say anything?”

She shrugs, but knows that Steve won’t accept that as an answer. “I can handle it. I’m enhanced, too.”

“Enhanced, not invincible.” She hears him uncap the cream, and she sighs in relief when Steve begins to rub it into her bottom.

“I grew up learning how to kill people, I’m not going to fall apart when I get a spanking.”

“When it leaves marks like that, maybe you should.”

She doesn’t know why that makes silent tears begin to trickle down her cheeks, but it does. They drip onto the sheets below her as Steve works the cream into her skin, soothing the ache that she has been feeling since the night before. She sniffs, and Steve carefully pulls her into a sitting position on his lap.

“You’re such a good girl,” he says, and those are the magic words for Natasha to wrap her arms around his neck and hold on for dear life, her face tucked into his broad shoulder.

“You’re one of the three bravest women I know, but that doesn’t mean you have to be brave all the time, all right?” He tucks his fingers under her chin and lifts Natasha’s face.

“We promised when we started this we’d tell each other everything. We can’t have this sort of relationship if you don’t follow that rule.” He pauses with a sudden stricken look.

“You don’t want to stop this, do you?”

“No!” It comes out louder than she intends, and Natasha clears her throat. “God, no. I—do you?”

She remembers how hard it was when she’d realized she was in love with both Steve Rogers _and_ his girlfriend. How she’d agonized over it, asked Hill for missions away from the Avengers, stopped answering Steve’s calls and avoided Sharon at headquarters.

Steve had kissed her first, in his apartment, slotting his body alongside Natasha as if they weren’t two separate people. She’d kissed him back, feeling herself respond in ways that she didn’t normally when it was a target, or just a quick lay to satisfy an itch. She’d had the vague realization that this was wrong, that she was causing a man to cheat on his girlfriend, and if Steve’s mouth hadn’t been glued to hers Natasha would’ve laughed at the irony of the Black Widow once again finding her conscience.

Then Sharon had walked in. She’d walked in and just as Natasha had been about to pull away with apologies, Sharon had tucked herself against Natasha’s back, her lips found Natasha’s neck just below her ear, and huh. Life was full of surprises, Natasha had thought, as the three of them fell together into Steve’s way-too-fucking-small bed.

In the morning, she’d woken up to Sharon making breakfast for _all_ of them, and the apologies died before Natasha had even had a chance to voice them.

“No.” He gives her a long kiss, his arms tighter around her. “I’m not going anywhere, but you don’t have to stay if you’re not happy. If you don’t… feel safe.”

“I do,” she assures him, reaching up to touch Steve’s cheek with her hand. “Wouldn’t be here right now if I didn’t.”

“Good.” Steve lets out a breath that sounds shaky, and smiles at her. “I’m gonna take care of you.”

“I know.” She hugs him, then stands up and offers Steve her shorts again.

“I guess we’ll put these on,” he says, helping her. “Even if you do look pretty hot without them.”

“Only pretty hot? You insult me, Rogers.”

He takes her hand as they walk into the dining room; Natasha notes that a pillow has found its way to her place at the table. She raises an eyebrow at Sharon, who just smiles at her.

To her credit, Natasha’s girlfriend waits until they’ve inhaled most of dinner before she brings it up.

“New rule,” she simply says. “No sexy times after punishment until we know that all of us are okay.”

Steve pauses with a forkful of chicken parmesan halfway to his mouth. “I hate that we have to _say_ that’s a rule,” he says, looking down at his plate. “That should’ve been a given.”

Sharon reaches across the table to squeeze his hand. “We said when we started that we’d make mistakes. We made a mistake. This is how we fix them.”

She’s lucky, Natasha says to herself again, perched ridiculously on a pillow and watching her sauce-splattered girlfriend comfort freaking Captain America. It had been Sharon and Steve first. But now… they were upset for her. They were doing this for her, to take care of _her_.

“I can live with it,” Natasha says quietly, then glances around, nervously. “I also have an idea.”

“What’s up, Natasha?” Steve asks.

“Maybe I need a few sessions on when to use my safe word.”

“Wait. You want us to force you to safe word?” Sharon shakes her head. “No. Absolutely not.”

“Oh, calm down,” Natasha says. “I’m good with you forcing _orgasms_ – _mostly_ – I’m not good with you forcing me to safe word. I just meant… maybe a couple of times when you _really encourage_ it.”

“Is there even a difference?”

“You’re the queen of the internet, Miss. I’m sure we can research it.”

“The miss giveth that pillow and the miss can taketh it away, Natasha Romanoff.”

And then they’re all laughing, and Natasha knows, it’s okay now.

Steve picks the movie – Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?, for some reason. He’s missed a lot, which means Sharon and Natasha have to suffer through movies they otherwise wouldn’t. But raspberry sherbet makes it easier, and so does being curled up on the couch between her boyfriend and girlfriend. Sharon’s a touchy one, with her hand constantly in Natasha’s hair in a way that lulls her and puts her into that small, quiet headspace where the buzz of life disappears. When Sharon is in “her zone,” as she calls it, she can be harsh and demanding, sometimes even slightly brutal. She’s even more dominant than Steve, which has made for some interesting situations.

But as much as Natasha loves those times, when she’s at the mercy of Sharon’s research, her lips and teeth and hands, she loves this time even more. When Sharon is still Miss, still one of the two in Natasha’s life that calls the shots, but she strokes Natasha’s hair and drops kisses to her temple, and makes Natasha feel safe and protected. This is what _she_ has missed out on, growing up in the Red Room, and it’s as if Sharon is desperately trying to make up for it.

Steve is still feeling guilty, though. There is a physical distance between him and Natasha that is irking her, so much so that when the movie is over and Sharon goes to take a shower before bed, Natasha hesitates only an instant before hauling herself into Steve’s lap.

“Oh, hello there,” he says in surprise, wrapping his arms around her waist.

“Stop it.”

“Stop it?”

“Stop this ‘I’m the worst person in the world, how could I do that, what the hell was I thinking’ bullshit you’ve got going on up here.” She pokes Steve’s forehead, then puts her head on his shoulder again.

“It happened. No taking it back, Rogers. But I need you to stop beating yourself up about it… sir. I need this, Steve. Not guilt. I have enough of that for all three of us.”

Steve purses his lips, looking almost as if he’s about to object, then lowers his head and kisses Natasha.

“You’re the best, you know that?”

“Oh, yeah.”

Steve tucks her into the center of the bed with a tap to her nose, then climbs in next to her. It’s a little odd, she thinks, that by ten o’clock they’re all exhausted enough for sleep, but she figures it’s been a hard enough day. Sharon turns off the light in the bathroom before coming to the bed herself, kissing Steve with an “I love you,” and kissing Natasha with a quiet, “Good night, darling.”

Steve says “I love you,” back to Sharon, and “See ya in the morning, Nat.”

Natasha wriggles a little in the bed on her back.

“Settle down, myshka,” Steve says into the darkness. “This isn’t playtime.”

“Yes, sir,” she replies dutifully, grateful that no, this isn’t playtime. She _loves_ playtime, but she also loves just getting to sleep, to spend the night warm and happy next to two of her favorite people in the world. She can hear Sharon’s soft, drowsy, almost-there snores, feels Steve throw his arm over his head, the way he always sleeps, and Natasha grins.

She’s almost asleep herself, her eyelids heavy, when suddenly she rolls over and drapes her arm over Sharon’s waist.

“Sharon?”

“Mm-hm.”

“Miss?”

“What is it, honey? You okay?”

She feels a little guilty that Sharon has woken up, tense with the fear that something might wrong, and Natasha pulls herself up onto her elbow to lean over and give her a kiss.

“Yeah. Just..”

She hesitates. She clears her throat.

“I love you, Sharon.”

And then Sharon is leaning up, kissing Natasha with a ferocious tenderness that leaves her breathless. Makes her wonder why in the hell she hasn’t said it until now.

“I love you, too.”

Maybe this love isn’t for children, Natasha thinks.

She settles back down. Rolls towards Steve.

“Sir?”

“Hm.”

He’s awake. Pretending not to be. She grins and rests her head on his chest. His heart is beating double time.

“I love you, Steve.”

Captain America chuckles, a rumble against her ear.

He squeezes her in his arms, purposely hard. She squeaks it out in his grip.

“Midgard?”

He releases her as Sharon laughs out loud next to them.

“There we go. I love you too, Natasha.”

She huffs a little into Steve’s tee-shirt as she smiles, reaching out with her hand until she finds Sharon and pulls the woman around her.

Maybe this love isn’t for children, Natasha thinks again.

Maybe this love is just for her.


End file.
